Smoothly rounded surfaces can improve the visual quality of your maps. They allow
more creativity and realism.
QuArK's advanced functions and features combined with ArghRad phong shading can produce very interesting
results.

A-Building the first element

1)-Create a brush 46x46 in top view.

2)-Move the cursor on the center of the brush.

3)-Open contextual menu and click Coordinates....

4)-Enter the new position 64 96 -64.

5)-Select the Quick cylinder maker tool.

6)-Set Grid to 1 and draw a cylinder with 12 faces.
Use the square brush as a frame.

7)-Position precisely the cylinder.

8)-Create a Group with the cylinder.

9)-A red dot shows the center of the group.

10)-Open contextual menu and click Add user center.

11)-A blue dot appears at the center of the group, by default.

12)-Open Movement Tool Palette.

13)-Set Rotation angle to 90.

14)-Click Y-axis rotation clockwise.

15)-The group rotates precisely around the user center.
The cylinder is now in horizontal position, along X axis..

16)-Apply texture metals/mt_mf_v3 to the cylinder.
And set Tex. scale at 0.25 0.25

17)-Let's make a first test...

18)-Go in YZ view. Select the cylinder. Select a face.
Open contextual menu and click Orientation...

19)-There s a little deviation. Check the other sides.
We must correct all the deviations to avoid bugs later.

20)-Set Grid to 1 and position the cursor
on uppermost vertex

21)-Press Ctrl click on the vertex and constrain it on the grid .

22)-Repeat the same steps for the 3 vertices indicated in red

23)-Open Movement Tool Palette and set
Rotation angle to 30.

24)-Select the group containing the cylinder. Not the cylinder itself

25)-Click X-axis rotation clockwise.

26)-Repeat the steps 21 22

27)-Select the group containing the cylinder.

28)-Click X-axis rotation clockwise.

29)-Repeat the steps 21 22

30)-Let's check again the Orientation of the cylinder's faces
as in steps 18-19. We must have only integer values

B-Smoothing effect

Arghrad's Phong shading feature allows smoothing on rounded shapes.
Two conditions are required to obtain this effect:
- each face must have a light value >0
- the texture must be wrapped without break

1)-Select the cylinder. Open the Face flags window and enter
100 WITHOUT checking the light flag.

2)-In XY view, select the left cap of the cylinder and erase the 100 Value
in the Face flags.Do the same for the right cap. Only the rounded faces must
be tweaked.

3)-In YZ view, select a face and hit Ctrl+T for tagging it.

4)-Select the adjacent face.

5)-Click Around pillar.

6)-Let's make another test. Now it looks better.

Now, we have a good base for the next steps.

C-Building the bend

1)-Set Grid to 4 and draw a brush 64x64 in XY view, starting from
the center of the cylinder.

2)-Select the group containing the cylinder and make a copy with Ctrl+C
Ctrl+V. Make sure in Configuration-Map-Options, that Screen center for Postion of
new objects in unchecked

3)-The second group still selected, move the cursor on the blue dot, click on it...

4)-...and drag it up to the upper corner of the square brush. Constraint it precisely
with Ctrl

5)-Open Movement Tool Palette and set
Rotation angle to 9.

6)-Click Z axis Rotation counterclockwise.

7)-The group rotates around its user center.

8)-Select the square brush. Select the right face and hit Ctrl+T for tagging it.

9)-Select the second cylinder. Select the left face.

10)-Hit Ctrl+G for glueing it onto the tagged face. The face is now aligned
with the user center

11)-Hit twice Origin on your keyboard to select the whole group.

12)-Click twice Z axis Rotation clockwise.

13)-Select the cylinder. Select the right face.

14)-Hit Ctrl+G. The face is now aligned with the user center

15)-Hit twice Origin to select the whole group.

Now we have a basic element for building the bend.

16)-Click once Z axis Rotation clockwise to rotate it in its final position.

17)-Hit Ctrl+C Ctrl+V to create a new segment. Click twice
Z axis Rotation clockwise to rotate it in its final position.

18)-Repeat the step 17 three times.

19)-Select the second, third and fourth cylinder segments.

20)-Move them under the first cylinder segment's group. Delete the remaining empty groups

21)-Rename the group "bend".

22)-Open Movement tool palette and set
Rotation angle to 90.

23)-Duplicate "bend" and click Z axis Rotation clockwise.

24)-The second group "bend" rotates around its user center.

25)-Select the initial group with the base cylinder .

26)-Drag its center user up to the upper corner of the square brush. Constraint it precisely
with Ctrl.

27)-Duplicate the group and click twice Z axis Rotation clockwise.

28)-Select the cylinder contained in the new group...

29)-...and move it inside the second group "bend" .

30)-Glue the left face of the cylinder to the right face of the last segment cylinder.

31)-Repeat the same operation with the first cylinder.

32)-Select the second group "bend".Drag its center user at the center of the fifth segment
cylinder, as indicated. Constraint it precisely with Ctrl.

33)-Click Y axis Rotation counterclockwise.

34)-The second bend is now in the right position.

35)-Select the first segment cylinder of the second bend. Select its south face and tag it.

36)-Select the fifth segment cylinder of the first bend. Select its north face.

37)-Hit Ctrl+G for glueing it onto the tagged face. The two bends are now
connected without hole nor break.

38)-Extend the first and last pipe. Add some lights and hide the square brush.

Let see the result.

D-ArghRad 2 or 3 ?

Phong shading can be tricky sometimes. It works well with Arghrad 2. But often
causes crashes with ArghRad 3. So, just use ArghRad 2? Not that simple... Arghrad 3
allows bigger maps and more interesting effects.
If problems occur, check the geometrical accuracy of the brushes sides with
Orientation... and enter round values. ArghRad 3 hates things like
.0001 or .9999 . All the map must be well clean, not only the brushes with phong shading
effect.
It may take time, but in the end it works.
Crashes can also be avoided by letting troublemaking brushes as "structural" (not DETAIL).
But, it's not really an clean fix and results in a longer VIS calculation.